Saturday, August 27, 2011

We're gonna roll this truckin' convoy 'cross the USA

That, children, is CW McCall doing a musical segment on something called a talk show in 1976. The funny box he's touching is called a CB radio. This was the Mike Douglas Show and it was different from talk shows like you have today. Don't tell anyone, but Auntie Erin has that very song, Convoy, on her iPod.

Other people who had the old time talk shows were named Dinah Shore and Merv Griffin. People talked on the talk shows while sitting on chairs that were lined up just so:

A lady named Betty White was always on talk shows.

Why yes! That's the very same lady as the one in the Snickers Super Bowl commercial.

Now children, let me tell you something about Dinah Shore that is sort of grown up. Dinah Shore may look all prime and proper in the short video we just watched, but she was doing some very naughty things with the man sitting next to her when no one was looking. His mane is Burt Reynolds.

That was from the Merv Griffin Show, which was on TV when Jesus was still alive. Look! There's Betty White again!

No, that's not a trick. Mr. Griffin is really smoking a cigarette indoors.

Scary things like that used to be on TV all the time, but that's enough of my stories for tonight. You children change into your jammies and I'll go and fix up the cocoa. Then we can all watch Jersey Shore before bed.

19 comments:

Remember the Superhost "video" they ran almost every Saturday afternoon?

For the uninitiated, the afternoon Cleveland horror show host shot a skit with himself and several of his crew in cheesey cardboard semi cabs intercut with truck movies (and the odd military shots for one passage). My favorite was the trailerless cab smashing through a glass wall at the end.

EOB, you've just posted NEARLY all the reasons I never did and still do not watch much TV. Hey - if it's big news, it's always made the news, and I can learn it that way. UHh - yeah - I want to know the most outrageous, etc., but I'll mostly let someone else weed through the BS to find the good stuff. That said, CW McCall's 15 minutes were right when Ex and I were planning our wedding. "WTF?" asked Ex. "I don't know, Babe. White people are not all 100% alike." He was OK with that.

Being a woman who has rather skated through certain situations due to the fact that she LOOKS like the school librarian, while the truth is . . . I GET Dinah bopping hell out of Burt, while still being Dinah. That works for me!

Out of curiosity, I googled "CB radio". Turns out they still make the machines. They sell for over $200. Apparently truckers still use them.

@Leslie-- With all due respect, Dinah Shore as the school libraian? With that sexy southern accent of hers? Plus, no school librarian I've ever seen wore as tight as sweaters as she did on her various talk shows in the '70s.Actually, Betty White playing Sue Ann Nivens on the Mary Tyler Moore show reminds me more of a school librian, though one horny for the Principal.

Since I see there's a number of Clevelanders leaving comments, let me give you one of my horror movie host remincenses. On Houlihan and Big Chuck there was a regular sketch called "Soul Man". Chuck Shodowski played a white TV reporter, who, whenever there was a crime being commited, would run into a phone booth, pop some special pills, and turn into Soul Man, a black superhero. In one episode, Chuck hears a cry of help, but realizes he has no Soul Man pills on him. He heads to the drug store, and sees a sign in the window saying the price has gone up (1970s--inflation, you know). Suddenly, a shady-looking character beckons our hero to a dark alley. This shady-looking character is willing to sell him some Soul Man pills for half-price. Hesitent at first, our hero decides to buy the pills. He walks into the phone booth, pops 'em in his mouth, and turns into Super Host!!!!

Burt did pretty well with the babes. Not bad for a guy with really bad rugs.:

From wikipedia:

At various points in his life, Reynolds was romantically involved with Tammy Wynette, Lucie Arnaz, Adrienne Barbeau, Susan Clark, Sally Field, Lorna Luft, Tawny Little, Pam Seals, Dinah Shore[15] and Chris Evert.[16] His relationship with Shore garnered particular attention given the fact she was 20 years his senior. Reynolds was married to actress/comedienne Judy Carne from 1963 to 1965, and actress Loni Anderson from 1988 to 1993, with whom he adopted a son, Quinton Anderson Reynolds (born August 31, 1988).[17] E! Online reported that he dated Kate Edelman Johnson from 2003 to 2005

That truckin' music fad all started when Bill Fries (aka CW McCall), an adman from Western Iowa, wrote a series of commercials with some toe-tappin' jingles for Old Home Bread, starring a waitress name Mavis. Can't find any of those 30sec spots, but there's this.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4EUrTTPnKQ Dig the Jew's Harp...

And tying the two threads together, I dare say that there'd be no 'Smoky & the Bandit' if there was never an 'Old Home Filler Up and Keep on Truckin' ad campaign, and furthermore Burt would have never schtupped Gidget/Sister Bertrille.

I sat next to Hal Needham, years ago, on a plane from LA to somewhere. He wrote the screenplay for Smokey and also directed it. He was a fun and funny guy, a good friend of Burt and nice enough to engage in a conversation with a young business man.

Erin-...Mike Douglas' shining hour was the week John and Yoko did the show-the ENTIRE week. It was around the time of the 'Somewhere in New York' lp, and the back-up band he was working with at the time was Elephant's Memory-remember "Mongoose"?-no, you wouldn't- you weren't born yet. I think I skipped school a few days that week,... This was just when Lennon's immigration issues were starting. Nixon viewed him as a threat. He should have been more concerned with Martha Mitchell, Dita Beard, and whichever company he bought his tape recorders from.MR

My personal "camp" favorite was Irv Kupcinet's "Kup's Show"... I think he invented the guest with a mask and an altered voice, usually talking about the Chicago mob. Then, after commercials he'd talk to Don Rickles and Robert Goulet.